https://www.dailymotion.com/video/xfy57h_clips-from-hot-dogs-for-gauguin-1972_shortfilms
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My first job out of graduate school (many moons ago) was as a children’s librarian at a public library in Jacksonville, Florida. My boss was a fundamentalist Christian who used to invite me and the other children’s librarian into her office every afternoon for a mini sermon on Christianity. This sermon usually consisted of boss reading something from the Bible. In retrospect, I realize she could have gotten fired for this, but in those days of long gas lines and big unemployment, no one rocked the ship. At least, not anyone I knew.
My refuge was the film department across the hall, where employees could rent projectors and movies for free. Yes, that’s right. This was in the days before personal computers, Google, the Internet, Netflix, and all the other techie wonders we take for granted. So one weekend, the film librarian and I rented a short movie called Hot Dogs for Gauguin and were in stitches. This short was one of the funniest and most poignant movies, short or long, that I’d ever seen. The filmmaker, Martin Brest, was an NYU film student at the time, in his mid-twenties. I wrote him a fan letter, a real letter – no email, remember?
We corresponded for months, with Martin talking about stuff that was in the works for him, that he was headed to the American Film Institute under the auspices of some BIG director. Was it Oliver Stone? Scorcese? I can’t remember. Someone major, at any rate.
During our correspondence, I changed jobs and went from social work to teaching Spanish to hormonal 7th graders. Brest went from NYU to the American Film Institute, and ended up at some point in South Florida. So we got together during his weekend here.
I lived a block from the beach and suggested we go UFO hunting one night. Martin resisted. It turned out that he didn’t believe in much of anything – not UFOs or psychic phenomenon, life after death or reincarnation. In other words, to him, my belief system was a joke. You can tell this friendship was off to a great start, right? Yet, this is the guy who years later, directed Brad Pitt and Anthony Hopkins in Meet Joe Black (1998), a remake of Death Takes a Holiday, which describes the plot exactly: death takes a vacation.
In 1984, Brest directed Beverly Hills Cop and in 1992, he directed one of my favorites, Scent of a Woman with Al Pacino, and then there was Meet Joe Black in 1998, and in 2003, a movie called Gigli. This last film was supposedly a monumental flop, but I didn’t see it, so I don’t know. Since then, nothing.
Where is Martin Brest? He’s now 61 years old, not old for a director. Look at Ridley Scott now 74, or Clint Eastwood, now 82, and you have a sense of cinematic vision.
So, I loved Meet Joe Black and its original version, Death Takes a Holiday. At the time I saw the movie, I was shocked he had directed it, he who didn’t believe in much of anything. But all of us change and evolve through our explorations in life. So, Martin, here’s the deal. I’ve got this novel Esperanza, with a script in progress, and its sequel, Ghost Key, that have after life themes. Let’s do lunch. In the meantime, please call my agent.
You know, I had an experience like yours! When I was 17 I lived for a while in swinging London, just out of high school, and I met a young, blond Australian with a mop of hair at a nightclub………..Graeme was my first love, and my first heartbreak when he told me he was going to L.A. to become a Director and get into the movies, and flew off to do so. Do we ever forget our first loves?
Imagine my amazement many years later when I rented the movie “Frances” and saw that it said “A Graeme Clifford Film” on the box! Damn! He really did do it! Recently I looked up his Wiki page, which said: “Graeme Clifford is an acclaimed Australian film director”………. what was even more wonderful was to look at a 2007 picture of Graeme. The face I remember was 20……….but it’s still him.
Wow. Will check out the link! When you’re 25…
what a great story! and for him to have directed MJB after all that! [loved that film, by the way] – and just in case he’s not a blogger, might i just suggest that you pick up the phone or search his contact info on google and take the bull by the horns, so to speak! 😉
The links about him sound like a board game: where in the world is…?
Yes, all of us change, we play many different parts and our beliefs evolve, hopefully for the better. Hope you get that lunch call! Lots of people Google themselves.
I’d say you had an effect on him!
I tend to think life is all about Change. If we remain static, what’s the point of even incarnating? Idealistically, individual change is accompanied by growth of some sort, although that certainly isn’t always the case, as there are thousands of folks “back-sliding” as they experience changes. My sister, for example, shifted from being in our born-again baptist family, as I was, to being where most of us here in Synchrosecrets are in terms of spirituality. Years later, sister suddenly slid back into the fundamental evangelical baptist roots and lost touch with her much more spiritual self. This is tragic to me, but is her choice and we don’t discuss it. She worries about my soul. I’ve tried to assure her that my soul is fine and dandy, to no avail. So, we continue to avoid conversations of a spiritual nature. Sad loss for me, but she’s happy being the fire and brimstone baptist. Changes come in all manner of ways as we journey through our lives. Let’s hope the director friend in today’s post has discovered the vast empowerment of a spiritual path that he finds satisfying, and maybe he’ll be in touch with the MacGregors!
I took mike’s suggestions and googled him. There are all sort of links like, What happened to Martin Brest?
Years ago, I remember Trish saying that the last thing Martin Brest said to her was “Let’s get back together when we’re both successful. Hmm, about time.
Yes, we all change through the years. I also now wonder where he is now, and what he believes. It’s almost impossible for me to remember the times when I didn’t see synchronicities everywhere!
Same here, DJan.